


A study in poetry

by shonny-girl (clemmy)



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Feels, First Kiss, Humor, Johns a poet, M/M, Mycroft being insulted by poetry, Poetry, alternative universe, poetry case, sherlock would be lost without his poet
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-04-06
Updated: 2014-04-13
Packaged: 2018-01-18 10:34:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1425352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clemmy/pseuds/shonny-girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After being asked by his therapist to write poetry to help him john ends up becoming a poet. Pretty weird career move for an ex-soldier. which when john meets Sherlock two month after he writes his first poem Sherlock is puzzled. Why would a strong Adrenaline junkie ex-soldier become a poet. And so to help Sherlock figure it out he invites John to be his new flatmate. This is the story of their lives and how they fall in love with the help of a overrated thing called poetry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A study of coping with poetry

* * *

 

**In Flanders Fields the poppies blow**   
**Between the crosses row on row,**   
**That mark our place; and in the sky**   
**The larks, still bravely singing, fly**   
**Scarce heard amid the guns below.**

**We are the Dead. Short days ago**   
**We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,**   
**Loved and were loved, and now we lie**   
**In Flanders fields.**

**Take up our quarrel with the foe:**   
**To you from failing hands we throw**   
**The torch; be yours to hold it high.**   
**If ye break faith with us who die**   
**We shall not sleep, though poppies grow**   
**In Flanders fields.**

* * *

by John McCrae

　

In a bedsit somewhere in London, John Watson is having a nightmare.

Every night he does, He is relives his Army days. Visions running through his head. his team under fire. Shooting everywhere. A colleagues crying out his name. people needing treating. All the time the gunfire continues. Never stopping, never ceasing. Crimson waves of blood covering his eyes.

John jolts awake suddenly, his breath heaving. Up and down , up and down. He sits up in bed his eyes opened wide. He looks around the room. its not his barracks in Afghanistan . He sees the city street outside his window He sees the desk with his Cain lyin against it., He can see the paint coming of the walls. He is safe, He’s in London, No war, No fighting. He Flops back onto his pillow, he has to be calm , he cant let it get to him.  
 _  
_He cant sleep. Some time later he has sat up on the side of the bed and switched on the bedside lamp. He noticed the darkness outside it was still night and he didn’t care. John sits quietly, wrapped up in his thoughts, he had let it get to him again. After all the conversations with Ella. He looked at the desk unhappily,. He knows it he will not be sleeping again tonight. _“ Maybe you should try it,” ,he thought, “ it might help.”_ So he picked up the walking stick and made his way to the desk. And on the desk was a notebook Ella had bought him with the words **_The poetry of john Watson._** He cringed at the writing _,” Ella doesn’t do things by halves.”_ he though as he opened the blank notebook. He stared at the blank page ,pen in hand with his mind equally blank.

The next day he went to see Ella. He always dreaded seeing his therapist, but it was necessary. He walked into the the cosy office , she was posed with a noted book and pen in hand. He grimaced at the perkiness of her countance. He wished she could wipe the smile of her faced but then checked himself and reminded himself that it wasn’t her fault. He sat down in the chain where he sat many time. And the session had begun.

,“How’s your poetry,” she asked him trying to give him an encouraging smile but it didn’t work it just made him irritable.  
“Yeah, good. Very good.” he pretended trying to give a confident smile back but knew that the lie was evident.  
“,You haven’t written a word, have you?”

,” She can see right through you.” he thought trying to think of a change of subject. He saw her writing and read what she was writing. Anger started to creep up him.  
“You just wrote “Still has trust issues”.  
“And you read my writing upside down. D’you see what I mean?” ,

“ Damn she’s good.” _  
_

“John, you’re a soldier, and it’s gonna take you a while to adjust to civilian life; and writing poetry about everything that happens to you will honestly help you.”  
“Nothing happens to me.”

,” Well then take this away with you.” She handed him a book. It was titled _war poetry._ and had a picture of a poppy on the front. ,” It might help, inspire you.”

Two Months later ….

John was walking through Russell square park. So Preoccupied with what he was doing he didn’t notice the people watching him as he walked briskly through the park. He needed to find a place in London to stay but the problem of money was creping up on him. The poems he was writing were a long distance from beign able to be published and he didn’t feel like he could get a plain job at the GP now. He was getting desperate. He so didn’t want to have to move in with his parents. And he honestly didn’t want to leave London. If only…

“,John! John Watson!,” he looked round to see where the sound was coming from. Who knew him in London? He looked around to see the man on a near by bench stand up. He puzzled about where to place the man. His minded vaguely remembered him but..  
“,Stamford. Mike Stamford. .” We were at Bart’s together dawned on Recongition, oh mike he remembered him. It looked like mike hadn’t aged well but who was he to judge?  
“Yes, sorry, yes, Mike. Hello, hi.”  
“Yeah, I know. I got fat!” John laughed. He had liked Mike. He had been one of the few students who hadn’t thought that they were gods new marvelous gift to medicine.  
“,No.” he said trying to hide a smile.  
“I heard you were abroad somewhere, getting shot at. What happened?” and with that reality came crashing down on him.  
“I got shot.”  
 __  
  
A little later John and Mike have bought take-away coffees. They sit side by side on watching people in the park pass by. John knows that Mike wants to talk about the army so he asks questions of his own.

  
“Are you still at Bart’s, then?” John asks  
“Teaching now. Bright young things, like we used to be. God, I hate them!”  
They both laugh remembering all the time they had talked about their teachers behind their backs. It is a universally truth that all students hate their teachers and that all students hate teachers. Just because they remind each other of the fact that they have work to do.

  
“What about you? Just staying in town ’til you get yourself sorted?”

  
“I can’t afford London on an Army pension.”

  
“Ah, and you couldn’t bear to be anywhere else. That’s not the John Watson I know.”

“Yeah, I’m not the John Watson …” John stops. He sees Mike awkwardly look away and drinks his coffee. He knows that he shouldn’t have nearly sniped at Mike. Mike was just beign nice and friendly. John clenching his hand it into a fist as he tries to control the tremor that has started. It was technique Ella had taught him it seemed to work. He looked up as Mike looked round at him again.

  
“Couldn’t Harry help?”

  
“Yeah, like that’s gonna happen!” _,_ “The only things Harry cared about herself and the bottle of wine she was drinking.” John thought

 _  
“_ I dunno – get a flatshare or something?”

“Come on – who’d want _me_ for a flatmate?”

John looked as Mike chuckles thoughtfully as though he was coming up with a neat little idea in his head.

“What?” asked John excited for the first time that week.

  
“Well, you’re the second person to say that to me today.”

“Who was the first?”

 


	2. John meets the detective

**To a Stranger**  by Walt Whitman   
  


PASSING stranger! you do not know how longingly I look upon you,     

You must be he I was seeking, or she I was seeking, (it comes to me, as of a dream,)  

I have somewhere surely lived a life of joy with you,   

All is recall’d as we flit by each other, fluid, affectionate, chaste, matured,        

You grew up with me, were a boy with me, or a girl with me,         5

I ate with you, and slept with you—your body has become not yours only, nor left my body mine only,  

You give me the pleasure of your eyes, face, flesh, as we pass—you take of my beard, breast, hands, in return,  

I am not to speak to you—I am to think of you when I sit alone, or wake at night alone,     

I am to wait—I do not doubt I am to meet you again,  

I am to see to it that I do not lose you

 

* * *

　

 

So later that day they make there way to St Barts. It feels weird to be in the place which used to be in second home. to John.They walk into a lab and John sees a man with raven black hair and pronounced high cheekbones standing at the far end of the lab using a pipette to squeeze a few drops of liquid onto a Petri dish. The man glances across at them briefly before looking at his work again. John limps into the room, looking around at all the equipment.

" Well, bit different from my day."

" You’ve no idea!" Mike says chuckling as if he has a inside joke.

The man gestures at Mike and says," Mike, can I borrow your phone? There’s no signal on mine."

There is a slight moment of silence as Mike comprehends the request.

"And what’s wrong with the landline?"

The man shrugs, " I prefer to text."

" Sorry. It’s in my coat."

John fishes in his back pocket and takes out his own phone." Er, here. Use mine." He says trying to hide the awkwardness in His voice.

" Oh. Thank you.” The man stands up and walks towards John. And for some reason he cant not possibly comprehend John’s breath hitches.

It is at this point that Mike finally deems it necessary to speak . "This is

an old friend of mine, John Watson."

 

The reaches John and takes the phone from him. Turning partially away from him, he flips open the keypad and starts to type on it. John stares at the man unconsciously inspecting him. He wonder what sort of important thing needed to be sent that he needed to use someone’s phone but not important enough that he could not uses the bloody landline. He studied the man some more, he was quite good looking really. He had that sort Byronic hero look about him. oh god he was reading to much love poetry really...

"Afghanistan or Iraq?" John was struck out his train of thought. He was a bit dazed for some reason.

"Sorry?" He said bringing himself back to reality

"Which was it – Afghanistan or Iraq?” The briefly raises his eyes to John’s before looking back to the phone. John hesitates. How the hell? then H looks across to Mike at Mike who for some reason smiling smugly.

"Afghanistan. Sorry, how did you know ...?"

A young women in a lab coat walks comes into the room holding a mug of coffee. Interrupting what John was saying.

"Ah, Molly, coffee. Thank you.” The man shuts down John’s phone and hands it back as Molly brings the mug over to him. He looks closely at her as he takes the mug. As if he is puzzled by something.

" What happened to the lipstick?” The girl smiles awkwardly at him. John feels sorry for her as it is obviously even from here that she has a crush on the man. “It wasn’t working for me."

"Really? I thought it was a big improvement. Your mouth’s too small now.” He turns and walks back to his station, taking a sip from the mug and grimacing at the taste. At the same time John is grimacing at Molly's face which looks crestfallen at the insult.

"... Okay." She turns and heads back towards the door. John follows her with his gaze as she walks away.

" How do you feel about the violin?" he turns and sees Mike who is still smiling smugly. John is getting really annoyed with that grin. He finally realises that the man is talking to him.

" I’m sorry, what?"

The man types on a laptop keyboard as though he is absorbed in something but still has the capacity to say." I play the violin when I’m thinking. Sometimes I don’t talk for days on end. "He looks round at John as if John is only just worth of his attention". Would that bother you? Potential flatmates should know the worst about each other."

The Man throws a hideously false smile at John. John doesn’t know how to react and looks at him blankly for a moment . what the hell? He looks across to Mike.

" Oh, you ... you told him about me?"

"Not a word." Mike says but John can detect a grin benieth the serious mouth.

　

He turns around to the man who was waiting expectantly, " Then who said anything about flatmates?"

The picked up his coat and started to putting it on "I did. Told Mike this morning that I must be a difficult man to find a flatmate for. Now here he is just after lunch with an old friend, clearly just home from military service in Afghanistan. Wasn’t that difficult a leap."

"How did you know about Afghanistan?"

The man blatantly ignores the question as wraps his scarf around his neck, then picks up his mobile and checks it. John is momentarily distracted by the notion that the man's phone was in his coat all along. Then why did he need to borrow a phone ?

"Got my eye on a nice little place in central London. Together we ought to be able to afford it."

The Man walks towards John. And John can feel that familiar hitch of his breath.

"We’ll meet there tomorrow evening; seven o’clock. Sorry – gotta dash. I think I left my riding crop in the mortuary."

Putting his phone into the inside pocket of his coat, The man walks past John and He heads for

the door. John was flabbergasted He turns to look at the man. “Is that it?"The Man turns back from the door and strolls closer to John again. And John wants to know why the hell he cannot get his breathing in control.

"Is that what?"

"We’ve only just met and we’re gonna go and look at a flat?"

" Problem?"

John smiles in disbelief, looking across to Mike for help, but his friend just continues to smile as he looks at Sherlock. John turns back to the younger man. "We don’t know a thing about each other; I don’t know where we’re meeting; I don’t even know your name.” The man looks closely at him for a moment before speaking.

" I know you’re an Army doctor and you’ve been invalided home from Afghanistan. I know you’ve got a brother who’s worried about you but you won’t go to him for help because you don’t approve of him – possibly because he’s an alcoholic; more likely because he recently walked out on his wife. And I know that your therapist thinks your limp’s psychosomatic – quite correctly, I’m afraid.” John looks down at his leg and cane indistinctively which he knew was noticed by the younger man who just smiled smugly.” That’s enough to be going on with, don’t you think?” He turns and walks to the door again, opening it and going through, but then leans back into the room again.

"The name’s Sherlock Holmes and the address is 221B Baker Street." He winks at John, then looks round at Mike "Afternoon."

Mike raises a finger in farewell as Sherlock disappears from the room. As the door slams shut behind him, John turns and looks at Mike in disbelief. Mike smiles and nods to him.

" Yeah. He’s always like that."

 


End file.
